I would like all three of you to comment on what I say next.
I'm not sure whether you know or not, but in late October, Quebec's two main labour funds, Fondaction and Fonds de solidarité FTQ, brought a proposal to the finance minister; it called for the continuation of the tax credit and addressed the federal government's concerns, including cutting the cost of the tax credit by reducing it by a third. That would mean a cap on how many new shares the two labour funds could issue.
Under the proposal, the two main funds would invest $550 million in private funds in Quebec, with the option of investing anywhere in Canada, not just in Quebec. A total of $400 million would be directly invested in private funds outside Quebec, including $120 million in the federal government's venture capital action plan. And just over $1 billion would be invested directly in companies, in addition to the funds' investments in the venture capital action plan.
That was what the two labour funds put forward in a proposal totalling $2 billion over 10 years, in exchange for the tax credit, which would end up costing somewhere between $80 million and $90 million a year. The federal government rejected the proposal, sticking to its decision, whereby it will spend $400 million in one fell swoop and that will be the end of it. What do you think of that proposal? How should the federal government have responded?
Ms. Kozhaya, you can start us off.